


All the Bells and Whistles

by Kooriicolada (WHM_Koorii)



Series: Built to Last [4]
Category: Mass Effect
Genre: Drabbles, F/M, Gap Filler, Non-Linear Narrative, squad bonding
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-12-23
Updated: 2015-12-29
Packaged: 2018-05-08 15:17:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 2,455
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5502575
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WHM_Koorii/pseuds/Kooriicolada
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A series of drabbles set in the Built to Last universe.  May span anywhere along the timeline of the games and beyond.  Mostly focused on Shepard, Garrus, and their interactions with the rest of the team and one another.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Close

**Author's Note:**

> Set during Priority: Tuchanka in Mass Effect 3, down in the ruins of the old Krogan city.

"Garrus," Liara said after the fifth time he nearly bumped into Shepard's back, "I...don't think you need to walk so close."  


"Look, it's dark down here—"  


"Don't turians have superior night vision?" Shepard muttered ahead of them.  "Or is that another myth I haven't been corrected on yet?"  


"We have flashlights," Liara pointed out placidly.  


"They have limited beam range," Garrus said, "and if I want to gun something down before it gets to Shepard I need to be in a good position.  Besides, with the frequent tremors—"  


"It's not necessary," Shepard said, cutting him off again.  She didn't even glance back at the two. "Appreciated, but not necessary.  I have a perfectly good assault rifle."  


"Point stands," Garrus drawled, and then the crack of his rifle filled the air.  Several dozen feet ahead of them a rachni bloated with Reaper tech tumbled down the cracked stairs.  Shepard tipped her rifle upward, brows flirting with her hairline.  
  
"Nice shot," she said. "I'd better let Wrex know there are rachni around."


	2. Blood

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Set during ME2, pre-relationship.

Omega had left Garrus with a hard, jagged cut edge. No matter how long he spent aboard the _Normandy_ he couldn't seem to shake it. Like a pall, Omega followed him wherever he went, a reminder as scarred into him as the damage to his face.  


Any time they docked at Omega, Garrus stuck close behind Shepard. Not because he thought she couldn't handle herself, but because he _knew_ Omega. Besides, there was a certain satisfaction in walking among the criminals he'd hunted over the past two years without them having a clue.  


Whispers would follow them, though less of them were about ' _Is that Commander Shepard? Isn't she supposed to be dead?'_ than he'd have thought. A solid half of them were:  


' _Look at that turian. See his face?'_  


_'That damage...'_  


_'Forget the that, look at the coloring—'_  


_'Think he's a mercenary?'_  


_'Probably. I wonder how much she paid for a brute like him.'_  


It was a unique experience, though what Garrus enjoyed (as much as he could enjoy anything on Omega) was the sharp-eyed looks Shepard gave the whisperers. It didn't matter if it was maligning him, or talking shit about Jack when she came with, or covetous eyes following Kasumi's sleek form. Shepard would have none of it.  


She never brought it up though, not for the longest time, and when she did, it was entirely unexpected.  


They were mired down just outside of a Blue Suns base, Thane slowly worming his way into a better position while Shepard hung back with Garrus. He'd caught an unlucky round across the side of his head that had sheared off part of his bandages and renewed the ache beneath. Shepard crouched beside him, dabbing anti-septic and medi-gel into place to staunch the bleeding and keep the still healing wound from getting infected.  


"Huh," she said, and Garrus glanced up from watching Thane's progress down his scope.  


"Huh?" he echoed, wondering vaguely if that was one of her 'a live grenade just landed a few feet behind us' sounds or something else altogether. Garrus supposed that if you'd died once then everything else became unimpressive.  


"You blood," she said, her gaze a hunting thing that flickered over his face.  


"Yeah," he said dryly, "apparently the bandage works as a target as well."  


"No," she said, reaching out to touch the _other_ side of his face with her medi-gel slippery fingertips. Then she looked at him with a sharpness that made foreboding settle in his gut. "I just realized that you must think you're some kind of badass, wearing turian blood blue on your face."  


Garrus coughed out a laugh at the unexpected comment and tossed his head, preening. "You may have heard of me. I'm a bit of a big deal."  


Shepard's mouth quirked at one corner before those predatory eyes of hers darted past him to check on their surroundings, ever alert. "I figured you were being vain and trying to match your C-sec colors."  


She slid up next to him, propping her own sniper rifle alongside his and sighting down the scope. Thane was nowhere to be seen which was a good thing.  


"Mmm, that was part of it," he murmured, adjusting his rifle's position and lining up on the spines of a turian crest peeking out of cover. "Call it my little rebellion. Dad wasn't impressed."  


"You _were_ trying to look tough." It sounded almost amused, almost accusing.  


"There's no trying to it, Shepard," he said.  


"So that's why the people on Omega keep talking about it."  


He couldn't imagine how long she'd been puzzling that out, or _why_ she'd felt the need to.  


Across the way, Thane dropped off the grating behind lines and snapped the neck of one of the humans. As soon as the turian lurched upright, Garrus took his shot--a neat headshot that tipped him forward. The sound of a second rifle fired near him, adding a spatter of bright human-blood red to the wall. Thane's pistol made short work of the others.  


"We like to let people know what they're up against," Shepard said, drawing his attention to her. She tapped the vivid stripe on the arm of her armor.  


Garrus quirked his head, considering. He'd never really thought about it, he knew humans bled red as a Palaven sunset but it only just occurred to him that yeah, she was wearing her blood-color as starkly as he was. He wondered what that meant to her people, though those were questions best saved for later. For now, Thane was waving them across, all clear, and they had an objective to complete.  


"Gives them a chance to run," he said dryly, rising from his crouch.  


If Omega had done anything for him, it had forced him to grow into his 'little rebellion'. These days, he knew he could be as dangerous as the color of his markings proclaimed him. What had been something brash was now _truth._

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one was requested by my friend who I dragged not only into Mass Effect hell, but Shakarian and Tsovik hell. She wanted to see Shepard realizing that Garrus is a dork who wears the color of his species' blood on his face like the badass he is.


	3. Shopping

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Post Hell and High Water.

Garrus had faced many challenges in his life, but this one was proving...difficult. With Shepard mired in the politics of restoring a galaxy, it was down to him to buy a few things they needed while stuck on the planet.  
  


When he left that morning he'd thought it couldn't be that bad--he could manage shopping. Now, as he scrolled down the stores terminal he wondered if he was _wrong_.  
  


Humans, he was beginning to realize, had extremely strange and arbitrary systems when it came to clothing. It felt as if he were trying to rebuild the _Normandy's_ firing matrix from scratch and in Prothean.  
  


Hesitantly he picked the 'Womens' display on the screen, then quirked his head at the array that unfolded before him in the digital catalog. Somehow, none of this seemed like something Shepard would wear.  
  


Maybe she'd been right when she told him to skip that part and just get them groceries.  
  


Behind him someone cleared their throat. "Excuse me, sir? I'm sorry, but we don't stock turian clothing, but I can recommend you to a place that's just getting started here. It's not that far away."  
  


Garrus half turned, peering at the human woman behind him. "Ah," he said, fumbling for words. It was amazing how much easier it was to command a squadron than it was to deal with _this_. "No, I was...shopping for someone else."  
  


She blinked, started and straightened up. "Would you like help then…?"  
  


"You know," Garrus said dryly, spreading his hands wide. "I think I'll just come back with her later, and get that recommendation."  
  


Groceries it was. Humans couldn't be that complex in that regard...right?

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yet another one for a friend of mine, who really wanted to see Garrus get baffled while trying to shop for Shepard.


	4. Murder

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Set in ME2, after Garrus' Loyalty Mission.

It was well into the _Normandy's_ night cycle when Thane slid onto the chair next to Garrus, silent as a shadow. The med-bay was dark and quiet, as was the rest of the mess hall. Miranda's door had long since turned red, denying entry as the woman caught her rest. Only the moody orange glow emanating from the open door of the forward battery really cast any illumination beyond the low floor lights.  
  


"Good," Thane said, voice buzzing in a way that was neither irritating nor pleasant. "You're not angry anymore."  
  


Garrus tipped the bottle of liquor he'd pilfered from the bar in the lounge, under Kasumi's bright and watchful stare. He hadn't drunk much of it, though his goal had been to drown out the anger and the feverish ache in his chest.  
  


Now, he wasn't sure what he felt.  
  


"No," he said at length, it tasted like a lie on his tongue.  
  


"Tell me," Thane said, palms resting on the tabletop, "Is it her you're angry with, or the situation?"  
  


Garrus didn't meet his unfathomable, dark gaze though he could feel it drilling into the side of his skull. _Was_ he angry with Shepard?  
  


He'd been angry for so long he wasn't sure anymore. If he really dug deep and thought about it, he'd been angry longer than just Omega. It had started before that, before the injustice of the council sweeping Shepard and her--their--work under the rug. It reached back and back to his days in C-Sec, or even further to his father and his own sense of righteousness.  
  


Omega had just brought that slow burning coal to a roaring fire.  
  


So, was he angry _at Shepard_?  
  


There were times when he had been.  
  


He'd been so angry at her for giving him hope that the system could change, that he could make a difference. Then he'd been angry at leaving him--them--to deal with the aftermath. He'd been angry that she _died and left them all behind._  
  


Tonight, he'd been blindly angry at her for getting in the way of his revenge; his justice. Now, though, he simply felt tired and worn down. The anger had been snuffed out and he'd been left hollow and ashen.  
  


Into his silence, Thane said, "She didn't want you to become a murderer."  
  


"I've done it before," Garrus said dryly. His hands weren't clean. No one's hands stayed clean on Omega, and while the kills he'd made there had been _just_ they hadn't been _clean_. Those kills hadn't been the bullet between the eyes he'd been planning on giving Sidonis.  
  


Thane hummed, folding his hands on the table before him. His dark eyes stared off into the middle distance as if contemplating something that Garrus couldn't fathom. "This," he said, "would have been different."  
  


A part of Garrus, still brash and angry, wanted to protest. He knew Thane was right. The moment Shepard had gotten Sidonis to start talking, the moment Garrus had really _looked_ at him, he had known.  
  


"I still wanted to do it," he said flatly.  
  


Thane made a small, understanding noise in his throat. "What stopped you?"  
  


Garrus' first inclination was to say ' _Shepard'_ but he stopped himself. That wasn't entirely true. In the end, _he had stopped himself_. Therein lay the crux of it all. He was _angry at himself,_ always had been. Garrus let out a rough exhale and rolled his shoulders and neck until they cracked, still tension tight.  
  


"You care about her," Thane said. "So you care about her opinions, and through her you were able to check yourself."  
  


"I used to admire her," Garrus said. Back on the original _Normandy_ when she'd stopped down in the cargo bay and listened to him talk about C-Sec, his dad, and his frustration over both. She'd brought with her a new sense of justice and freedom he'd never known. It had kindled a fire in his gut to set things _right_ , one that had eventually drove him to Omega. Now, again, she had reminded him of that fire but more she had pressed him to _temper_ it. To learn to bank the flames to his will and not the other way around.  
  


"And you no longer do?" Thane's words were a question, but his tone already hinted at the answer.  
  


"No," Garrus said, "now I respect her."

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I always love the idea of Thane talking to Garrus after the whole thing with Sidonis.
> 
> For TPHW who commented saying they'd like to see some Thane interaction.
> 
> This is the last one for tonight at least. I hope you all have a happy holiday!


	5. Anniversary

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Set sometime after Hell and High Water.

“ _Garrus,”_ Shepard’s voice said over the intercom, “ _you got a minute?”_  
  


“For you? Of course.”  
  


“ _Meet me at the elevator.”_  
  


Then, just like that, she cut the channel and the battery turned quiet again. Humming a curious note to himself, he stepped away from the read outs and headed down to the mess. At the table foremost table, Kolyat looked up and waved in greeting. Garrus returned the motion, and strode onward.  
  


The elevator doors stood open, Shepard reclining against the wall inside. Garrus narrowed his eyes at her as he stepped in beside her. “What are you up to?”  
  


Shepard tapped her hand against the panel, sending them down toward the hold. “Up to?” she echoed, but he _knew_ that smile. It was the one that drew the lines around her mouth into focus and narrowed her eyes. It was the one that meant he was either going to really, really like what she suggested next to _hate_ it.  
  


“Shepar—”  
  


“Close your eyes, Garrus.”  
  


“Uhhh?”  
  


She gave him an arch look, and Garrus held his hands up in surrender. He knew when he was defeated. Hands still up, he closed his eyes tight. Her hand caught his, three fingers weaving with five, and she lead him out of the elevator.  
  


He counted the steps they took, knowing the exact width and breadth of the _Normandy’s_ cargo bay like he knew his rifle. They were, he knew, all the way at the end of the hold. She tugged him even further, down what he assumed was the opened bay doors, then stopped.  
  


Feather-light, Shepard’s lips ghosted across his scarred mandibles, and she whispered, “Happy anniversary.”  
  


He blinked his eyes open.  
  


Garrus stared for several long seconds. "That," he said slowly, "is an Atlas Mech."  
  


"Yep," Shepard said, popping the end of the word in that way that Turians couldn't.  
  


It wasn’t _just_ an Atlas Mech. It was an Atlas mech that was painted blue, silver, and black, and emblazoned with the Archangel symbol in discreet places. He stared a little longer.  
  


“Where—How did you..?” He hadn’t stumbled over his words this badly since she’d first propositioned him. With the galaxy still pulling itself back together, it was hard to get mechs in good condition. Of course, he knew that Shepard’s name alone could work wonders but...  
  


“I traded a volus information on rich mineral deposits,” she said idly.  
  


“I can’t believe you remembered…”  Hell, he barely remembered.  
  


She laughed that gunshot laugh of hers that still made his stomach turn over and warm. "What do you think?"  
  


He turned toward her, and Shepard crossed her arms over her chest. She looked _immensely_ smug. "I think," Garrus said, "we're going to need bigger bottles."

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Been feeling a bit down today, so I finished up this little drabble idea and decided to toss it up. 
> 
> It came to me during a play through of the Citadel DLC where Garrus says he's always wanted an Atlas Mech...so, Shepard remembered and got him one.
> 
> I fear for people when he gets the guns overclocked to his liking....

**Author's Note:**

> Well, I wasn't going to post anything but I was playing a bit of Mass Effect 3 and the inspiration struck. Heck, if anyone has any ideas or prompts about this series' characters they'd like to see feel free to put them forward and I might write them. Can be anything though out the timeline of the games and whatnot.


End file.
